Above an Alpha Ch. 01

She laughed. Genuine, pure laughter poured out of her. He was shocked. Getting it under control, she broke into a giggle before saying, "I'm smarter than you. I'm stronger than you. I have a way better sense of humor than you. Why would I give up? I'm going to win." She finished her words with an open-mouthed grin, looking at him like he an attraction at Disneyland.

And suddenly he smelled it too -- she had no fear. No fear of him. No fear of anything.

A mere human woman wasn't afraid of him.

It was more than he could take. He pounced; he was in the air one moment and the next he had her pinned to the bed. "You were saying you're stronger than me?" he growled.

Her smile was smaller, but still there. She even seemed a little regretful, like the moment was bittersweet. It enraged him. She looked him in the eye, speaking slowly and clearly. "The only strength you've shown me is your body. But you'll know my strength when I win."

His hands transformed, cutting through the bedding and into the mattress beneath him. Her eyebrows rose high above her eyes, and she almost laughed again. She didn't say, "Why are you ruining your own bed?" but he knew that was what she meant with the face she was making. He couldn't help himself; he ran his tongue up the side of her face.

He pulled away then, surprised at himself. He didn't get up, just rose enough to get a good look at her reaction.

She wasn't disgusted, or particularly excited. She might have looked a little sad. Something in her was still trying to be bright, untouched. "I'm sorry," she said, shaking her head. "But I always win."

He wanted to rip her throat out.

----------

Trent was an omega. --Which always was always deeply disappointing to female werewolves when they met him; because boy, he would have been something to howl home about if he had been an alpha or even a beta.

The guy was tall, well-muscled, blonde, with a sweet boyish face and lovely white-toothed grin. Unfortunately, there was more to being top dog than looks. A rarity in werewolf kind, he had been born with terrible eyesight. He wasn't blind or anything. But he did have to wear huge coke-bottle glasses. Being in his wolf form improved things, but he still didn't have the eyesight other wolves had, and relied even more heavily on his other senses as a result.

Then there was the shyness. --Trent was terrified of women, social situations, loud noises (because loud noises usually caused people to lean closer to each other during conversation, which meant that a woman might, during some loud social situation, lean in toward him so that he could hear her better and end up smelling his breath which could be randomly terrible -- though it never was because he had other phobias as well which included) being unhygienic, and planes.

So Trent was a lovely, clean-cut, healthy, timid omega werewolf. He was really good at math. He was a team-player, and enjoyed serving the pack despite the fact his particular pack didn't treat omegas very well. He thanked Luna every night that he was a werewolf; not only because his mother had taught him to pray every night before bed, but because he was relieved by the fact he was a werewolf.

After all, werewolves had true mates -- which meant that when the right girl came along, she would know it as well as he did. There would be none of the awkwardness humans experienced while having to date. He would not have to convince her to love him -- which he was sure would be impossible even if he had to do it. Everything would fall into place easily. When he finally met his mate, they would live happily ever after for a thousand years, filling their den with dozens of cute little omegas to carry on after they were gone.

Trent was actually day-dreaming about his future mate, when a beta, Greg, walked by and kicked him. Trent face-planted in the flowerbed in front of him; he had been tending the one that lined the front walkway of the main compound. He got up quickly though, and waved good naturedly at Greg as Greg entered the building. "Shut up, Short Bus," Greg hollered in response to Trent's silent wave.

"Oh I should have been paying attention," Trent replied, blushing because the prettiest beta in the compound knew his name.

Trent got back to work, but was distracted by more and more betas hurrying into the compound. He checked his watch -- it wasn't the normal time or day for a meeting. Suddenly, Lucy, another omega who had been working not too far away sidled up to him. "What's going on, do you think?"

"I don't know," Trent replied, taking a step away from her for a little extra space. "Something big, I suppose."

Suddenly Earlene, the second-in-command to the Alpha, popped her head out the door. She scanned the area before her eyes fell on Trent and Lucy. "I can't find the head omegas," she barked.

"Oh, they're out sick," Lucy replied. Trent was too busy staring at the scars on the ancient bitch's face to reply. He wasn't bothered by the scars, but it was like looking at a train-wreck. He always had the urge to get a closer look; unfortunately Earlene was not only a woman, but the scariest damn woman on earth. He pushed his glasses up on his nose a bit higher, hoping for more clarity. But Earlene looked the same.

"Get the rest of the omegas working on the guest quarters. --The downstairs guest quarters."

Both Trent and Lucy were surprised -- not only to have gotten treated like the head omegas in the head omegas' absence, but because of the order. Humans were coming. -Humans who had probably just discovered the existence of werewolves and were going to have to be locked up until they were mated and changed, or killed.

Suddenly Trent's stomach fell.

Humans were coming.

Oh, his mate couldn't be a human. He had watched every episode of Friends -- human relationships were nuts! Luna! What if his mate was one of these humans that were coming?!?

He followed Lucy absentmindedly as they went to alert the other omegas. She seemed happy. "You know what this means!" she gushed, "Potential mates!"

"Yay," Trent replied glumly, as they passed through a hall. A teenaged theta passing by tripped him, and Trent apologized, "Sorry about that."

"You're gay!" replied the theta.

"That's so rude to gay people," Lucy tsked.

----------------------

The rogue werewolf, Moe, dragged Leah out of his room by the arm, before depositing her on the floor of the doublewide with the four other human women. The rest of them were dirty; hair matted, their skin grimy over their bruises. Moe's buddies, Luis and Bartok, were still sitting at the dinette table playing cards.

No one mentioned the fact Leah was still unharmed, untouched, despite all the time spent in Moe's bed.

No one mentioned the fact that the other women hadn't been raped once since Leah had been abducted and brought here.

The truth was beginning to spook Moe, Luis and Bartok. -And though they couldn't do anything about it unless they talked about it, none of them wanted to talk about it. It was too strange.

All three had wanted Leah the moment they smelled her; no, that wasn't it. They had wanted not her, but to know what she was. --No, that wasn't it either. They were attracted to her, but not sexually so much as... she was that feeling you get at the edge of a cliff, the feeling that wants to jump.

When they approached her that day in the park, she had turned and looked at them, like she knew what they wanted. Then she shrugged and said, "Okay, what?"

"We look like cubs to you?" Luis demanded, failing to notice that a human knew what they were.

Moe's first instinct was turn and run. But she said she was human, and once she said it -- it felt right. She was human. She was just a human. She was just a human woman, and she smelled nice. Why not add her to the harem? They needed more women, and here they were in a conversation with one. "You're coming with us."

Leah laughed deeply and loudly.

Bartok zapped her with a stun gun. She looked at him irritably. She took it from him and hit him in the head with it. Then she smiled again. "Good times," she said, laughing, before she walked away. Moe picked up the stun gun. It wasn't broken. They stared after her.

They stalked Leah for a while after that, trying to figure her out.

Leah was unnoticeable to other humans. She was 5'7, 200lbs in a good combination of muscle and fat that left her with a defined though slightly jiggly figure, and she seemed to be just about thirty years old. She had brown curly hair to the waist, green eyes and frequently chapped lips. As Moe, Bartok, and Luis followed her over the next couple weeks, they learned that she lived alone, drank lots of wine, and divided her time between cartooning and teaching. Sometimes they got the sinking feeling that she knew that they were there. Other times, she seemed oblivious.

The night they took her was one of those oblivious times.

They had broken into her house in the middle of the night, planning to bind her quickly before she woke up.

They did.

But they didn't need to rush, they soon discovered, as there was nothing they could do to wake her up.

She didn't wake up when they grabbed her limbs, or tied them together. She didn't wake up when they turned on the lights.

Moe tried to spook her awake by saying her name creepily, aloud. "Leah... Leah..." he crooned like a ghost.

Leah just snored at him.

"What is wrong with this girl?" Luis demanded, as they all stared down at the husky girl in a Doctor Who cotton tee and purple star pajamas bottoms, her breasts obscuring the shape of the Tardis.

Bartok picked up an empty box of wine next to Leah's laptop. "I think she has a drinking problem," he said.

"Maybe we should have our fun now," Luis said, smiling.

"Yeah," Moe agreed.

They all looked down at her, ready to pounce.

No one did.

"Uh, you guys want to taste her first?" Moe finally asked.

"Nah, nah, you're the man," Luis replied. "You take her."

"I don't know;" Moe said, "I took all the other girls first. You guys should have a chance."

"She's fat," Bartok said.

"She's not fat!" immediately replied Moe and Luis, though they were immediately shocked by their fervent defense of her.

"Er, maybe the same people who know what the hell a Doctor Who is?" replied Luis, accusingly.

"It's just sleepwear!" Moe said. "She's still a woman. We're still wolves! Rogue wolves! We take what we want! Look at her. She's a nice slab of meat there. Imagine riding that. It's time to take what we want, boys."

They all went quiet for a moment, listening to her snore.

"Do we want her?" Bartok asked.

Frustrated, Moe did a face-palm before deciding aloud, "Let's just take her home. We can have sex with her later!"

Later, Leah woke up, undid her bindings and walked about the doublewide, yawning, trying to figure out where the heck she was.

"Hell," said one of the other kidnapped girls. "That's where we are, Hell." The speaker's name was Lisa, and she wasn't taking being victimized well.

"Oh," replied Leah, glancing out the window. "So they have good music?"

----------------------------

Once the other omegas had been informed of the situation, Trent cleaned himself up to get back to the main offices. His primary job was to handle pack money. Depending on how many humans were coming, he knew he might have to shift some things around.

Keeping kidnapped humans underground was expensive, after all.

He considered the base expenses, knowing that it had to be more than five humans that were expected; five or less and they wouldn't have bothered with the underground accommodations. He needed an exact count though -- the difference between six and sixty was pretty vast.

They couldn't be bringing sixty though, could they?

Where would sixty kidnapped humans come from?

Trent took his favorite legal pad with him out to the living rooms where the alpha could usually be found. Sure enough, Trent discovered Mark playing Wii bowling with his little sister, Sarah.

Mark, the alpha, was huge -- just short of being what one would call muscle bound, with arms like a Norse god and abs like a Greek god. He was handsome and kind enough generally -- but enough of a bro that he wasn't entirely likeable either.

Sarah on the other hand was skinny and bat-faced, but only mischievous, not malevolent. She was fifteen and generally fond of super villains of the Saturday morning variety.

They both rolled their eyes though when they smelled Trent walk in. To them, he was the biggest weirdo on earth! Always so awkward! --And he never knew when to back off in his awkwardness. He just kept being awkward!

"Good afternoon, Alpha sir."

"Yo," Mark replied.

"I was hoping to prepare the finances for the humans' arrival, but I'm afraid I don't have a headcount yet."

"Yeah," Mark said, releasing his Wii bowling ball. "You'll have to count them on the way in."

"Look Trent," Mark began again. "I have no idea. The Larson pack discovered a bunch of rogue wolves have been rounding up at a mobile home park out in northern Arizona. They'd take them all themselves because they're closer, but transporting kidnapped people across state-lines could get ugly quick. --Especially up there, everybody'd think we were Mormon or something. So we're taking them, but Larson's lead on this. Apparently it's one of his guys that started the rogue pack."

"No, I suppose not," Trent replied, shifting his glasses around on his face. "...Just wanted to be prepared. --For the good of the pack."

Both Sarah and Mark had to smile at this. Trent was a freak, but a good one.

He was still standing there though. --Just standing there.

Sarah and Mark exchanged looks.

"Er, anything else, Trent?"

"Oh, um..." He seemed to be genuinely thinking about it. Then, "No, sir. Thank you." He turned and walked away.

Sarah shook her head and joined her brother on the couch.

They sat there, thinking about what a weirdo Trent was for a minute, before suddenly Sarah smiled and elbowed Mark a few times, saying, "So... humans... that haaaaaaave to be mated. Hmmmn. Wonder what's gonna happen? Ruling alphas aren't supposed to be single, I hear."

"Shut up!"

"Are you going to get a girrrrlfriend? Is she gonna be preeeeety?"

"Sarah, I swear to Luna if you don't shut up," Mark began.

"Are you going to give me a sister? And nieces? And nephews??!?"

Mark pushed his sister off the couch with his foot.

"Hey!"

"You just better hope none of the humans in there are males. If a human starts sniffing around you, he's losing a limb -- and not one of the ones with fingers or toes."

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Leah had started taking to walking around outside the double-wide that Moe, Luis, and Bartok occupied, "for fresh air." She was still always in her Doctor Who shirt and pajamas bottoms; though she complained about needing a bra because her boobs were sweaty, this was the one thing that the wolves put their foot down on. They weren't going back into town to hunt down bras. She was beginning to get irritable about it. She didn't mind being barefooted, but bras were effing necessary.

Moe knew immediately that her outside excursions were going to cause problems, but he decided to let it go. Maybe one of the other wolves would take her off his hands. --She was confusing, after all. They had wanted her, they had obsessed over her, they had taken her. But in retrospect, kidnapping her didn't seem right. Moe wanted her in his bed, but couldn't bring himself to touch her. He worried about her, for reasons he couldn't understand, and in return she just made him feel ashamed.

He was seriously considering returning to his pack and begging forgiveness.

But it would be better if somehow Leah just disappeared from his life.

A few days later, it looked like that might happen.

Elias, the seriously sociopathic werewolf that had begun this gang of rogues, came back one night to smell Leah's strange scent wafting on the evening breeze. He stalked over, finding her reading an old book on Moe's porch.

"And who do you belong to, Little Girl?" he asked, getting Moe's, Luis's and Bartok's scent off her, but not smelling anything sexual.

She looked up, confused, a little like she was still in the world of her book. Then she processed the question. "Er... uh... Phi Beta Kappa. Triple A. Women's Cartooning Guild? What you looking for?"

He grabbed her by the shirt and pulled her to her feet. He smelled the back of her neck. She smelled like danger and power -- but she was human. "I'm asking who fucks you."

"My husband. Some day. When I meet and subsequently marry him. After many, many dates of course."

"Girl your age isn't a virgin."

"How old do you think I am?!?" she demanded. Her vehemence startled him. He actually let her go and stepped back a bit. "Some people make it to their forties without becoming some floozy. Some people believe in true love and soul mates and waiting!"

He grinned. "Waiting is one thing I've never been good at!" he declared, grabbing her again, mouth open to devour her lips.

Her eyes made him pause. He swallowed, holding his place just inches from her face. "What are you?" he whispered.

"Not that kind of girl," she replied.

He closed his mouth, and his first instinct was to let her go and move on. But he never let a girl go before -- and now, especially now that he had gone rogue, he had no plans to start. He moved his lips to hers slowly, a chaste kiss. --Sometimes the best route was the easy one. He'd get her off her guard, and then once those burning green eyes were closed in trust -- he could do what he wanted.

Midway through the kiss he opened his eyes, and found her still looking at him -- pissed.

"You have any idea who I am?" he growled.

"Yeah, I sneaked a peek at your nametag when we were chatting at the punchbowl earlier."

"What?" he asked. She rolled her eyes, and began to reply when he heard it -- someone was coming. A lot of someones were coming. And they smelled like wolves.

He pushed her on her ass and howled in warning to the others. A fight was coming.

Moe was on the porch and pulling Leah up by the arm in a moment. He didn't even know what he was doing at that point -- Leah had to be somewhere safe if a fight was about to start.

The other girls followed her into the closet in Moe's bedroom, where he told them to be quiet. "And don't get any ideas -- those aren't human authorities, just more wolves," he warned.

Leah leaned back against the closet's back wall, then felt something. She reached back, before pulling it out of the darkness and squinting at it. "That jerk's been hiding merlot!" She scrambled her hands along the closet floor, squinting at found items in the darkness. "And chianti! Well heck -- grab one of those wire clothes hangers." Lisa handed her one in confusion and Leah smiled. "I don't need no stinking corkscrew."